Looking into the virulence of Candida parapsilosis: A diagnostic perspective

摘要

In many diagnostic microbiology laboratories the species identification process starting from cultured colonies has recently undergone some significant changes. Where not long ago carbonitrogen source utilization tests in the form of colorful tubes or well-based devices down to chip card size dominated the field, we now find a purely biophysical instrument, a MALDI-ToF mass spectrometer. Instead of evaluating growth only after overnight incubation, the results are now available within minutes of sample processing.1 At the same time, the depth of differentiation is significantly increased beyond what a cultural method can do. In an assimilation assay the number of data points is limited by the number of compounds tested, in mass spectrometry by the number of biomarker ions observed. In the first, common numbers range between 16 and 42, many of these not being able to discriminate between closely related species. In the latter, the number of biomarker ions observed usually exceeds 100, depending on spectrum quality. These are spread out over a mass range of approximately 10 kDa and most of them are unique even between closely related species, to some degree even between different isolates of the same species.